


Nico Adopts a Cat

by DroppedAllTheseOreos



Category: Kamen Rider Ex-Aid
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-10 18:54:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15955430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DroppedAllTheseOreos/pseuds/DroppedAllTheseOreos
Summary: Kiriya spends Christmas alone





	Nico Adopts a Cat

It all started with a video call.

The day started off like any normal Christmas Eve. Jungo and Kiriya spent the morning haphazardly throwing strings of lights and poorly cut paper snowflakes all over their shared apartment. By the end of it, the two were covered in tape and bits of paper. Kiriya kept sticking awful snowflakes to Jungo's face while he was balancing on a chair to get a string of lights around the door frame to their apartment, so Jungo tackled and wrapped the wires around him in retaliation. Kiriya was tangled up and restrained to a chair for the remainder of the time Jungo went around and decorated.

Now that they were settled down, Jungo was texting rapid fire between their small group of friends. All of them were going to be late for some reason or another, and he assured them it would be fine. Kiriya was still struggling against the wires, that he somehow managed to get even more tangled up in, when he got a call from Nico.

Nico rarely ever initiated contact unless she was sending memes or something significant was going on, and it was always through text, so a call was concerning. Jungo looked up from his phone at the sound of Kiriya’s going off and fished it from his pocket. He angled the camera to both of them and answered it.

“Kiriya! Oh! Hi Jungo!” Nico screamed on the other end, waving at both of them.

She was smiling, so it didn’t seem like there was any trouble but the fact that she was video calling them was still disconcerting.

Jungo gave a small wave back, and Kiriya shrugged his shoulder a little in response.

“Wait.” She squinted at her phone. “What are you guys? Ooh, kinky.” She teased with an exaggerated tone.

Jungo took a minute to process, looked at Kiriya and suddenly registered what she meant and screamed “NICO!”

Kiriya burst out laughing at him. Jungo smacked him on the shoulder. “She gets this from you, I swear, no one else in her family is like this.”

The two took a moment to cackle at Jungo as he protested until they all calmed down.

“So, Nico, what’s up?” Kiriya asked, and she immediately brightened.

“I found a cat!” She flipped the camera to reveal the angriest looking cat Kiriya’d ever seen in his life. It was hissing and curled up under a bush.

From the scenery he could make out, it looked like she barely left her neighborhood and stopped around that creepy abandoned hospital.

“Isn’t he so cute?” She squeaked, and the camera shook a little bit.

“I don’t know about cute, but he's definitely pissed off.” Kiriya murmured, and Jungo shook his head to hide a smile from the other man.

“Look at him! He’s so grumpy!” Nico continued to fawn over the cat.

Kiriya and Jungo shared a look before turning back to the screen.

“Nico, are you still coming over?” Kiriya asked.

“Yeah definitely!” She mumbled with a distracted tone Kiriya recognized as her “brushing you off with fake enthusiasm because I’m busy with this part of a video game” voice.

“Nico.” He said a little more sternly.

She sighed exaggeratedly. “Yes, Mom. Don’t worry, I’m just gonna say hi to the kitty for a little longer, and I’ll be at your guys’ place before you know it!”

“Shoots.” Kiriya grinned.

“See you soon, Nico!” Jungo waved.

She hung up with a little wave and both of them relaxed back into their chairs. After a bit of silence, Jungo smiled.

“How much you bet she ends up keeping the cat?”

Kiriya huffed a laugh in response. “Dude it’s almost guaranteed she’s gonna try. Will her parents let her is the real question.”

He then resumed his wiggling to escape from his light string shackles, and Jungo had to laugh at how ridiculous he looked.

…

In the next few hours, Jungo received various cancellations and “I’ll be late” texts from their friends. Emu texted he’d be a little late, and five seconds later Hiiro suddenly sent a text saying to disregard anything Emu typed. After some back and forth between both of them, Jungo put them all in a group chat to amusedly watch the two fight while somehow avoiding the topic of what was wrong altogether. Eventually, with some prompting, he got it out of them that Emu was sick and running a fever. Hiiro was fighting him to stay home. Jungo assured Emu that it’d be okay for him to rest since there’d always be another get-together.

Suddenly they both stopped texting. Jungo felt a spike of concern but trusted them to figure it out and turned his attention back to Kiriya untying himself. About an hour later, Hiiro let them know he'd wrestled Emu back into his house, and the intern collapsed out of exhaustion. So Hiiro would be staying with to check on him. It was also to “ensure neither of them infected the rest of the party because he no doubt had Hojo’s contagion all over him.”

During all of that chaos, Nisshi texted Jungo a wordy apology explaining he and Riko had to deal with some family issues before coming over. Riko, on the other hand,  just sent an ominous “soon” to Kiriya’s phone.

During that time, Kiriya managed to free his arms and sent back a slightly less ominous “soon” in response. He also unsuccessfully attempted to scoot himself to the kitchen for water.  He ended up tipping over and fruitlessly squirmed to get upright for a solid minute while he waited for Jungo to stop laughing and help him.

Just when they got Kiriya settled in his original spot, Nico called them again.

Kiriya picked up the call with his newly freed arms and was greeted with a closer look at the angry cat.

“Nico! Oh my God!” He shouted.

“Okay, look, I have a perfectly good explanation for this.” Nico began defensively as she turned the phone back towards herself.

She was holding the phone out just enough that he could see she was carrying the cat and no longer near the abandoned hospital.

“He looked really cold, so I’m just taking him in for a little to get warm.”

“Nico, do not bring that cat to our apartment.” Jungo warned.

“I’m not bringing him over! I’m just gonna drop him off at a pet shelter or something!” She scowled. “I just wanted him to say goodbye to you two jeez.”

Jungo sighed. “I’m sorry, Nico. Just, be careful with him okay?”

“Yeah yeah, I know he could be carrying diseases.” She sighed. Suddenly her phone was shoved into the cat’s face again, and he hissed. “But look at him!” she gushed in a baby talk voice. “He’s cold and alone and needs someone to care for him. He’s like a Christmas cat!”

“Nico.” Kiriya said in a deadpan tone. He knew where she was going with this.

“Look, you’re the one who taught me that this holiday is all about caring for people less fortunate, so I’m just doing my Christmas duty!” She declared.

He snorted a laugh in response. “Alright, alright. Take care of him and yourself okay?”

“Roger!” She grinned cheerily. The cat growled and started biting at itself. “Ah, I think he has fleas. I gotta bathe before I come over, okay?”

“No worries, do what you gotta do.” He waved.

“See you guys!” Nico bounced the cat in her arms like a baby before she hung up.

…

It was about another hour before Nico called them again. Her spirits looked considerably dampened when they picked up this time.

“Nico? You okay buddy?” Kiriya asked.

“All the shelters in the area are closed for the holiday. There’s a big one that’s kinda part of a vet clinic further in the city, but it’s such a far walk…” She whined, then looked sadly at the cat in her arm. He seemed to have considerably calmed down since they last saw him.

Jungo and Kiriya simultaneously looked at each other, then down to where his legs were still tied to the chair.

“I got a car, I can come and get you, Nico.” Jungo said, then turned to Kiriya and lowered his voice. “It’s probably better for taking the cat than your bike anyways.”

Kiriya nodded sadly and went back to tugging on the lights on his legs.

“I’ll be over to pick you up soon! Just send me your location!” Jungo called over as he started walking to his room. Nico made a noise of acknowledgment then hung up.

Jungo went around the apartment, getting a thick coat and his keys before stopping. “Okay, watching you struggle was fun, but do you want me to get you scissors? I mean I’m gonna be leaving you behind either way, but this is going to get sad if I just leave you like this and you don't escape in the next hour or something.”

“I got this far, at this point, scissors would just be giving up and wrecking these lights.” Kiriya pouted. “And if you’re gonna ditch me for Nico and her cat then might as well leave me with something to do so I don't mess up the apartment out of boredom.”

“Are you sure?” Jungo leveled him with a serious look.

Kiriya met his gaze with an equally serious expression and nodded.

Jungo gave him one last glance back and shook his head. “Stubborn.”

He went back into his room and came out with a pair of scissors, laying it down on the table and then giving him a quick wave as he ran out the door.

Kiriya glared at the scissors like they personally assaulted him and continued trying to worm his way out of the cords.

…

An uneventful 30 minutes later found Kiriya sprawled on his back under the table. After realizing his earlier fall crushed most of the lights that had run up the left side of his body and the string would be useless if he got it off anyways, Kiriya gave in and cut them with the scissors Jungo left him.

As he stared up at the dark underbelly of their dining table, he tried to clear his mind. He needed to resist attempting to do some weird experiment to stave off his boredom and not worry about Nico and Jungo out there in the cold trying to take care of this dumb cat. His phone went off rapid fire and saw it was texts from Riko.

 ‘Not as soon as we thought.’

‘But…’

‘soon.’

Kiriya laughed and texted back

‘soon.’

Nisshi immediately texted after. Just a brief explanation that Jungo told him to message Kiriya since he’d be busy with Nico and that they might not be able to come over until late that night, or briefly tomorrow morning.

Kiriya jokingly texted back that Riko texted him ‘soon’ and that should be as good as a promise to see them sometime today. Nisshi shot him an exasperated kaomoji and told him they'd see what they could do, and he should take care. Kiriya fired a ‘you too’ back and returned to staring into space.

He lost track of time but was snapped out of his daze by his phone going off again. It was a message from Nico with a photo of her, Jungo and the cat. ‘Made it to the vet! (=^w^=)/~***’.

He let out a chuckle and replied with a ‘congrats!’.

A few minutes later Jungo messaged him that the shelter wouldn’t take the cat in since they didn't have space and would probably put him down unless someone took him. Nico was extremely distraught. In a moment of weakness, Jungo offered to take him temporarily until Nico could convince her family that the cat was a good idea.

Kiriya sighed and typed in a thumbs up and ‘this is the luckiest Christmas cat in the world. Yeah we’ll keep him.”

Jungo continued to update Kiriya about the cat. Since Nico was going to take him in, the vet offered to neuter and microchip him at a discount for the trouble of getting him all the way there and because he was a “Christmas cat.” So they took them up on it. But they were going to let the cat calm down first since Nico picking him up really stressed him out. Jungo went out to a nearby pet store to grab a carrier cage, some food, and shampoo for the cat while Nico waited with the cat for his operation.

Kiriya shook his head and fired off some responses before dozing off under the table.

…

When he woke up, it was because of another call from Nico. He groggily answered it and squinted at the screen.

“Hi, Kiriya!” She shouted.

She was leaning over in the passenger’s seat to try and get Jungo and the cat carrier in the frame.

“We’re on our way back! Taiga got a bath, he doesn’t have his balls anymore, and they said he’s gonna be all good! We’re just gonna stop over at my place and let my parents know, and then we’ll be right over!”

“Nico… Why the fuck are you naming him Tiger, he’s a black cat with patches, not stripes. He's not even orange.” Kiriya asked slowly.

It was hard to make out, but there were disgruntled, groggy mewls in the background as Nico started to protest Kiriya’s comments on her name choice. She called him an awful English-speaking foreigner in the process; which was deserved, but also ow. Kiriya was about to respond when suddenly an unholy scream of utter despair and loathing screeched over the line. Kiriya shot up in shock and smacked his head on the table. The camera shook as Nico flinched and her hand wavered between just dropping the phone to cover her ears or holding tight to it in fear of it falling under one of the pedals while Jungo was driving. Somehow, probably because he was jaded from years of living with Kiriya, Jungo managed to keep his composure and kept driving calmly.

There was a solid minute of dead silence as Kiriya and Nico just stared at each other in absolute horror.

“Do you think he figured out he’s not… complete anymore?” Jungo asked nervously, the silence getting to him more than the cat’s screeching.

“You think?” Kiriya yelled sarcastically, rubbing at his head, vision a little blurry.

“Oh my God, Jungo why did you say it like that!” Nico smacked him on the arm.

Jungo winced in pain and the car swerved slightly. “Jeez, Nico! Not while I’m driving!”

“Sorry but just! Dude!” Nico exclaimed then turned back to Kiriya. “Anyways I’m gonna hang up and lecture your roommate on word choice, see you soon!”

With the call suddenly cut Kiriya just sighed and noticed he missed some messages from Riko while he was asleep. He opened them, and they just read “tomorrow” and “sorry ORZ.” He typed out a quick “it’s okay. tomorrow.” and placed his phone on the floor. He took a moment to process the whole situation and shuffled his way out from under the table. After shakily standing up, he headed to the bathroom to check out where he bumped his head and freshen up.

…

The next few hours saw Kiriya eating some leftovers from the fridge, then laying on the couch and fiddling with the settings on the strings of lights. He absentmindedly watched them flicker and wondered if he was concussed as he flipped through the various settings. They kept the regular lights off during the day since enough light flooded in through the windows but now that the sun had set, the apartment was dimly lit in technicolor by the various strings of blinking lights.

The calm, almost surreal atmosphere was suddenly ruined by his phone going off.

He rolled off the couch with a groan and crawled under the table where he forgot it. It was just a regular call from Jungo this time.

“Hey Kiriya, sorry.” Jungo started nervously. “Will you be okay with spending tonight alone? I know Christmas Eve is usually a thing for us and you don’t like being alone… but, it’s pretty late, and Nico’s family trapped me. You know how they are.”

Kiriya chuckled. “Yeah, they like you a lot, y’know? You’ll probably be trapped there forever. Nico’s gonna have to be my new roommate. At least we’ll finally be able to pay bills on time with all her tournament money instead of me holding you back.” He heard a subtle intake of breath and assumed Jungo was getting ready to protest, so he quickly cut him off. “But yeah it’s okay, I’ll be fine. Have fun over there. How’s the cat anyways?”

“Hostile.” Jungo huffed. “I think he’s still upset about… You know…” Kiriya cackled. “I mean it’s understandable!” Jungo exclaimed, but Kiriya could hear the smile in his voice. “But Nico’s family’s taking to him surprisingly well. They think Nico needs some more responsibility in her life so it might be a good change.”

Kiriya hummed in acknowledgment before crawling out from under the table. “Well, I guess it’s good that she gets to keep him. Do we still gotta cat sit him for a while?”

“Unfortunately, yeah. They’ve gotta clean up a little bit to make the apartment safer for the cat and make space for a scratching post and all that…” There was a pause then Jungo whispered. “When I say apartment, I mean just Nico’s room.”

Kiriya burst out laughing. “Oh my God, we’re gonna have this cat _forever_.”

“Don’t be mean!” Jungo squawked, his voice cracking a little bit.

Kiriya tried to compose himself and managed to wheeze out “Okay. I’ve kept you long enough. Go have fun with the Saiba family.”

Jungo hesitated for a little. “You sure you’re gonna be okay? Not gonna die of boredom without me there?”

“Yeah, I’ll be good. Go on.” Kiriya urged.

Jungo sighed, and Kiriya could almost picture him running his hand through his hair worriedly. “Okay. Take care of yourself, and the apartment better be intact when I come back with Taiga.”

“Roger that.” Kiriya replied with a small smile and waited for Jungo to hang up.

He listened to the call cutting off before breathing in deeply and collapsing onto the couch. He turned off his screen and stuck the phone in his pocket, watching the soft glow of lights in their apartment dance across the walls slowly. His hands itched for something to do, and he started considered experimenting with something weird like that time he filled the washing machine with soda or tried to hang himself up on the fridge by hot gluing a bunch of magnets to his clothes. He actually started fiddling around in the kitchen to try and figure out something fun to do.

He considered cooking and doing something productive for a second before realizing everything he ever made came out burned. And that thought turned to what if he tried to explode things in the oven by not venting them properly. However, for once in his life, Jungo telling him to leave the apartment intact actually helped his impulse control. Maybe it was because he kept overthinking this whole cat situation and started running the factors in his brain that there was going to be another living being in the house with them. And the cat probably had as much capacity for caring for himself as Kiriya did. Maybe knowing Jungo’s attention would have to be split between them both, and he’d have to help with the cat too stopped him from doing anything rash. He needed to make sure Jungo and the cat had something to come home to.

He collapsed back onto the couch and decided that dying of boredom would be better than stressing Jungo out, just this once.

…

When Jungo came into their apartment the next morning, it was blessedly still intact, and no messes he could see from the front door. He'd have to do a more thorough look around later but for now, he had a cat and a Kiriya passed out on the couch to deal with. He set Taiga’s carrying cage down and let the cat explore his temporary home. He moved over to Kiriya and brushed his hair out of his face to check on him. His skin was cold, and Jungo started looking around for something to cover him up with when Taiga suddenly jumped up onto the couch and settled next to Kiriya's belly. The cat looked around, then curled up and fell asleep.

He pulled out his phone and snapped a picture. Immediately after, Nico texted, asking if the apartment was on fire yet. He sent the photo to her with the message

“I think we’re gonna be okay.”


End file.
